Phil Marlowe wrote in a message to Roy J. Tellason:

RJT> I guess those office folks are into buying fantasy, too...

CA> I thought that but they _suceed_ this way. They get job titles,
CA> raises, promotions, etc. It's like "Alice in Wonderland".

> Or something. No wonder those "Dilbert" comics are so popular...

CA>> It's funny for about a week and then it becomes very unfunny when
CA>> you can't get anyone to do their work so that you can do yours
CA>> when it's a 'team' effort.

RJT> Yeah. I take that sort of thing rather more seriously than most,
RJT> and go in there to get the job done, not goof off.

PM> About productivity in offices: Scientific American ran an article 
PM> based on a government study about it, specifically about why use of 
PM> computers hasn't increased it very much. Trouble is, this was about
PM> five years ago so don't know if it still applies.

PM> From what I can recall, some factors involved were:

PM> Downtime.

PM> Difficulty in using software.

PM> Personal use of computer.

PM> Not sure as it was awhile ago but I think it was the last that was 
PM> the biggest factor. And going by the stories you read about workers 
PM> sending personal emails, visiting porn sites, and even running 
PM> their own businesses from the office computer, I wouldn't be 
PM> surprised.

Some of the things I hear about really get me.  Visiting porn sites,  for
example.  I know what sort of a mood that would put _me_ in,  and an office
surely isn't conducive to dealing with it!  Maybe,  depending on your
co-workers,  but then there's still the issue of privacy...

PM> One area where productivity was increased was in the typing pools 
PM> of large legal firms. But then that's a very controlled environment.

PM> BTW, Roy, in another post you mentioned some Scientific American 
PM> article you were interested in. It might be online. There's a delay 
PM> before they put the articles online -- I guess because they want 
PM> you to buy the magazine, but they do end up online. Unfortunately, 
PM> this info is -also- 5 years old: I haven't looked at the site since 
PM> then. Worth a look-see tho.

I don't have web access here at this point in time.  I would have to go to
the library to check that out,  so I'll just look at the magazine instead, 
something I can do far more comfortably...   :-)

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